Conversations about the End of Time

This work does not really hang together very well. Each of the respective contributors does his own thing. The work contains according to the book - jacket these essays. " Paleontologist Stephen Jay Goud on dating the Creation, evolutionary ' deep time' and the need for ecological ethics on a human scale. Novelist, medievalist and Web fanatic UmbertoEco on the breave new world of cyberspace, and its likely impact on memory, cultural continuity and access toknowledge. Catholic historian Jean Delumeau on how the Western Imagination has always been haunted by ideas of the Apocalypse. ScreenwriterJean- Claude Carriere on the 'art of slowness' and attitudes toward time in non- Western cultures.' The work nonetheless contains much interesting information and speculative matter. One small piece from the work, the great Paleontologist Goud is asked " How do you see earth looking in a thousand years time? ' His answer is humble and refreshing. " I don't see it. The things one can actually predict are not very interesting. The sun will continue to shine.. But the history of human beings-and that's what your question is about - consists only of unpredictable events. What we are least weel- placed to predict is technological evolution. I can't predict what will happen in fifty years, let alone in a thousand.. Culture evolves in a Lamarckian way, in that it allows the transmission of acquired characteristics. We directly transmit what we have learned to subsequent generations, which is why technological evolution is ultra- powerful, cumulative , directional ..

Conversations About the End of Time is a a discussion of questions and answers given by four thinkers. Stephen Jay Gould, Umberto Eco, Jean-Claude Carriere and Jean Delumeau all answer questions and are given a chapter in this book to espouse their respective answers.Just think of a coffee table discussion, of a one on one discussion and you get to read the answers on questions of import. Each answering these questions with their respective insights and down-to-earth style. Each having their respective life experiences to draw from to unravel perplexing questions.With fascination you read the thought-provoking answers. The answers will suprise some, others may be right inline with what you'd expect, but nerver boring... challenging, educational, lucid and erudite are more what you'd expect and you are not dissapointed. This book reads fast and the questions are cogent with the general topic. Each respective thinker answers in a style of their own and the reader does not feel irrelevant. This is an interesting book in that questions asked make the reader think as well.I found the book to be highly interesting and it has a fascination woven throughout the text captivating the reader.

---------- ----------I'm talking about that Darwinian theory of Natural Selection you keep telling as if it were true. It is "differential reproductive success". So then that means I need at least 2 different things to call some event NS. So then I ask myself what do these 2 different things have to do with each other? So then I say well either they influence each other's reproduction some way, or they could as well be in different environments. So they must influence each other's reproduction some way. So then I ask, what ways can the one influence the reproduction of the other?+/- increase reproduction at cost of the other +/+ mutual increase of each other's reproduction -/- mutual decrease of each other's reproduction +/0 and so on -/0 0/0but what you do, is pretend like there are only +/- relationships. You ignore all other type of relationships with NS. Your natural selection theory is false, for being unsystematic in describing the relationships between living beings. You make teachers into liars by it.

Four thinkers (Gould, Eco, Jean Delumeau and Jean-Claude Carriere) come together to ponder questions about the end and beginning of the world and the state of mankind and the planet in Conversations About the End of Time. Philosophy blends with science to provide some intriguing thoughts about the nature and future of the world.